Are you being deliberately obtuse, Cote?
Neither of Lorna's posts mention anything about the number of readers, nor did the thread deletion message.
As Lorna pointed out above, the OP of the thread approached them with privacy concerns , and this is what lead to the deletion.
If, as you assert, all the Reddit posters are MNers (or ex-MNers), then they all know the 'rules' concerning AS and 'joining the dots' and potential outing.
What was going on on Reddit was not acceptable by MN standards (which is why it doesn't take place on MN). The thread wasn't merely 'discussing' the post from here, it was dissecting it, dragging up details from other threads, misinterpreting info, adding spurious 'facts' and doing it all under the banner of "well, it's our right to discuss all this"
It is, indeed. But it is then extraordinary to complain when a poster withdraws their thread because of it, or when MN decide to support their poster and try to help them maintain their anonymity.
The Reddit thread, with it's blister and bravado of "well, if she didn't want it discussed she shouldn't have posted it" is spectacularly. Issuing the point. The poster didn't 'want it discussed', she wanted help and advice.
Of course if it had been taken up by the Fail, or tweeted or promoted on FB (although I thought MN had agreed not to highlight sensitive topic threads on social media?) then the thread would have reached a 'wider audience' too. And there would have, no doubt, been many disparaging and derogatory comments. But I doubt that wider audience would have had either the time or the inclination to AS, cross reference, and just plain make up whatever they liked to fit some weird agenda, coming ever closer to doxxing. And certainly not with the same viscious glee that is shown on the Reddit sub.